What direction will D&D head in?

[redcard]

. Plus the most popular aspect of 3E, is now completely changed: multiclassing.

I'm actually quite chuffed about that being changed, to be honest. My players tended to be splatbook minmaxers , and it meant that if you were not good at doing that in my group, you'd get wiped out by an encounter I'd create to try to actually challenge those that were good at it.

 

[Oblique]

In terms of design goals and style of gameplay, it more closely resembles 1st and 2nd edition than 3.x did. I have read many comments in this very forum from people who are coming back to the game from a background in 2nd edition for whom 4th unquestionably feels like the game they know. And I find it hard to credit that anyone coming in to the game from a background in other systems wouldn't immediately recognize it and label it as D&D. Frankly, Bump, I think you lack perspective. 4th edition is D&D, it will and already has been accepted as D&D, and in 6 years there will be an entire marketing demographic of gamers for whom D&D has never meant anything else. And, when 5th edition is published, those people will identify D&D with 4th edition and see nothing but what is different between the new edition and the one they know. Every edition has been the one that radically departed from all that went before, according to the ones doing the declaiming. The fact remains that for someone who has spent the whole time playing Runequest or what have you, D&D is essentially its own genre ,with far more similarities between editions than it has to any other modern RPG -and every edition still boils down to the basic premise of "a priest, a thief, a fighter, and a magician explore some catacombs."

 

[ExploderWizard]

Sorry, but I can only say that I find it ridiculous to assume that my ability to create a campaign will be hampered by 4E. In fact, I already have a long-running campaign idea and I do not see a point where it could be hindered by daily powers or healing surges.

Maybe I am just thinking totally different from you, but I really absolutely honestly don't get how you can come to this conclusion. You can talk about hand-waving and internal balance or the combat grid all you want, it doesn't seem to get me closer to understanding how the hell this gets in the way of creating a campaign.

Here's my scenario:
Point of Lights is the base assumption. But, even the small points of lights are being threatened. Various groups try to amass power, one (yet not clearly defined, though I an envisioning an undead army) in particular. But as the heroes become aware of the first signs of evil threatening the Points of Lights, they begin to travel the world to create new alliances between the points of lights to eventually create something that can stand up against the looming threats.

Pretty simple, actually. Could be Lord of the Rings, I must admit, but with less focus on magical rings that need to be dropped into Volcanoes.

Where does 4E inhibit this campaign idea?

No edition puts a clamp on campaign ideas or campaign design for that matter. If your players can accept forgetting how to use basic powers after swapping them out for other powers while still maintaining interest in those characters and the game world then you have no problems at all.

For me this would be like telling players of a previous edition that thier wizard can now use 2nd level spells so they can no longer access 1st level spells. (Unless they want to swap out some 2nd level ability for a 1st level one)

The result is a character with a fractured existence. Complete power change as opposed to power growth and development. The building of the new upon the old fosters a sense of continuity that is completely lost with hot swaps. To disconnect the capabilities of a character from the awareness of that character is what sacrifices immersion.

 

[Desdichado]

What do you guys think? Where do you think it's headed?

[size=-2]I keed, I keed! [/size]

 

[Bump2daWiza]

In terms of design goals and style of gameplay, it more closely resembles 1st and 2nd edition than 3.x did. I have read many comments in this very forum from people who are coming back to the game from a background in 2nd edition for whom 4th unquestionably feels like the game they know. And I find it hard to credit that anyone coming in to the game from a background in other systems wouldn't immediately recognize it and label it as D&D. Frankly, Bump, I think you lack perspective.

I don't think I lack perspective. We just might differ on this highly subjective subject. I do think it ironic that more old school gamers are coming back to the game as a result of 4E. I started on 1E, and actually like 2E best out of all the editions (just a quirky preference I guess). But I don't see any mechanical similarity between 4E and those two older editions. I think the similiarity is more int he spirit of the editions than the mechanics. The vancian magic system is all but gone. The introduction of at-will, encounter, daily powers is a radical departure from previous editions. The actual rules for miniature combat resemble 3e more than 1e or 2e, as do the rules for actions. Basically 4e, for me, is a combination of StarWars d20, d20 modern, WoW, and the simplicity of something like Savage Worlds.

 

[Oblique]

I suppose the difference, then, is that I consider changes in specific mechanics largely irrelevant if their collective result is similar gameplay. It seems more important, in terms of the game being identifiably Dungeons and Dragons, for the game to play like D&D than for the game to have mechanics in common with previous editions of D&D. I also see a larger mechanical disparity than you between the core system of 3.x and those of previous editions, evidently, but that's another matter.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

No edition puts a clamp on campaign ideas or campaign design for that matter. If your players can accept forgetting how to use basic powers after swapping them out for other powers while still maintaining interest in those characters and the game world then you have no problems at all.

Yes, I totally think they can. They won't even blink. It is so incredibly meaningless to the quality of our role-playing experience or the campaign that I don't think anyone of them will even jump through the hoops to "rationalize" it using "players narrative control" or "forgetting unused abilities" or what ever we come up here on these boards for that.

Retraining was already well-received in the PHB 2. And we had no problems converting our Savage Tides campaign from 3.5 to Pathfinder (well, aside from the problem that our DM didn't feel any improvement in playability and decided to convert the campaign again, this time to 4E), despite the fact that I had to reinvision my Warlock as Sorcerer.

The thematic concept of a character are far more important then his specific mechanical abilities, as long as the abilities still help the theme of the character.

 

[Bump2daWiza]

I suppose the difference, then, is that I consider changes in specific mechanics largely irrelevant if their collective result is similar gameplay. It seems more important, in terms of the game being identifiably Dungeons and Dragons, for the game to play like D&D than for the game to have mechanics in common with previous editions of D&D. I also see a larger mechanical disparity between the core system of 3.x and those previous editions, evidently.

Personally I don't feel like the game plays like D&D at all. I think it has the simplicity and narrow range of earlier editions (and I don't mean that in a bad way-- I liked the range of 2E), but that it plays more like a video game than an RPG (at least that is how the powers make it feel for me). I just don't get "D&D" from the new system. I know lots of people do, but I am just being honest.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I suppose the difference, then, is that I consider changes in specific mechanics largely irrelevant if their collective result is similar gameplay. It seems more important, in terms of the game being identifiably Dungeons and Dragons, for the game to play like D&D than for the game to have mechanics in common with previous editions of D&D. I also see a larger mechanical disparity than you between the core system of 3.x and those of previous editions, evidently, but that's another matter.

I see a recurring theme: Thematic similarity versus Mechanical similarity.

 

[ExploderWizard]

Back on topic to the original post, I think the direction D&D is going will depend on who owns the trademark. If it remains with Hasbro then future editions will consist of a single rulebook, miniatures, and packs of cards for encounters, powers, and treasures. This model will generate more revenue (collectable cards and physical components that every player needs is more profitable than a book that a group can share) Modules are a dead end in this model because marketing a product to a subset of a niche market is losing money.

If this happens then it will be a huge financial success or they will alienate the community and it will flop.

If it flops then they will likely dump the brand by killing it or selling it to another company. If that happens then the future is very fuzzy.